Journal of Family Violence最新文献

Purpose

This study aimed to understand how college-going young men and women in Bengaluru, India experience violence within dating relationships and their understanding of the role of gender in dating violence.

Methods

In-depth interviews were conducted with 14 undergraduate students aged between 18 and 21 years old. The data were analyzed using the framework of Interpretive Phenomenological Analysis.

Results

Five key themes emerged from participants’ accounts: (1) defining abuse, (2) experiencing abuse (3) impact of abuse (4) abuse is gendered and (5) abuse is multifaceted. The first theme identifies how definitions of abuse are ambiguous and context-specific while the second theme discusses how young adults experience abuse as feeling controlled, losing control or self-protection. The third theme highlights how abuse causes distress but can also invoke coping while the fourth theme discusses the unique gender dynamics in abuse. Finally, the fifth theme identifies the perceived role of individual and community-level efforts in preventing abuse.

Conclusions

Violence is experienced as a complex and distressing part of dating relationships. The phenomenological insights gained from the study underscore the need for early identification and have implications for developing dating violence interventions in colleges and for future research in similar contexts.

Purpose

The current study aimed to explicate the link between relationship cycling (breaking up and renewing) and aggression. The goals were to: (1) assess if different types of aggression were more prevalent in cyclical as compared to non-cyclical relationships, and (2) determine how conflict management and relational dependence might explain the association between cycling and aggression.

Methods

Using CloudResearch.com, longitudinal data across four months from 177 individuals in challenging relationships were collected. Participants completed up to six surveys three weeks apart. Psychological and physical violence as well as coercive control were assessed as indicators of aggression; participants rated both their own and their partners’ aggression. Aggression, conflict, and relational dependence were collected at each timepoint in addition to the occurrence of breakups and renewals. Cyclical and non-cyclical categorizations were determined by the baseline data.

Results

Cyclical partners (as compared to non-cyclical) were more likely to experience unidirectional, severe violence and control and less likely to report no violence or control in their relationships. Analyses also showed that managing conflict ineffectively was associated with violence and control (particularly by participants’ partners), and participants’ relational dependence was associated with their own controlling behaviors towards their partners. In assessing relational transitions, aggression, conflict, and dependence all predicted breakups across four months; yet, only aggression predicted renewals.

Conclusion

Overall, findings suggest aggression leads to cycling (i.e., renewals). Additionally, more dynamic, interactive processes (e.g., conflict management) might explicate the link between aggression and relational transitions better than more stable relational qualities (e.g., relational dependence).

Purpose

Cyber dating abuse (CDA) has proliferated alongside the use of electronic communication technologies. Research indicates that further understanding into the individual and relational correlates of CDA will aid efforts to prevent harmful cyber dating behaviors. This study examined whether positive or negative romantic relationship quality act as intermediary variables between emotion regulation and CDA perpetration within and between romantic partners.

Method

A sample of 65 emerging adult heterosexual couples completed self-report measures on emotion regulation, positive and negative romantic relationship quality, and CDA perpetration. Data were analyzed using the Actor-Partner Interdependence Model for Mediation.

Results

The results revealed that a person’s higher emotion regulation indirectly related to their own lower CDA perpetration through their own lower negative relationship quality for both women and men. Results also showed that women’s and men’s own higher emotion regulation related to their partner’s lower reports on negative relationship quality which, in turn, related to that partner’s lower reports on CDA perpetration.

Conclusions

The findings provide insight into how a sense of emptiness in romantic relationships can explain the link between emotion regulation and CDA perpetration. Implications for preventing CDA through targeting emotion regulation skills and healthy romantic relationships are discussed.

Purpose

Intimate partner violence (IPV) is a serious public health concern that is highly prevalent among couples with alcohol misuse. It is well-established that alcohol can exacerbate negative IPV outcomes; however, less is known about how hazardous alcohol consumption, combined with family composition, such as the presence of children in the home, may impact IPV in a dyadic context. The current study examined the separate and interactive roles of the couple’s caretaking status and alcohol use disorder (AUD) severity on psychological and physical IPV victimization.

Methods

Secondary data were analyzed from 100 couples considered high risk due to reporting physical IPV and at least one partner meeting criteria for AUD. Multilevel mixture models were used to dyadically test how caretaking status and each partner’s AUD severity, separately and interactively, related to the couple’s psychological and physical IPV severity.

Results

Caretaking status and one’s own AUD severity, when examined separately, were positively related to psychological and physical IPV victimization. One’s partner’s AUD severity was also related to severity of physical IPV victimization. There was no evidence of an interaction in this sample.

Conclusions

Caretaking status played an important role in IPV victimization even when accounting for AUD in high-risk couples. Caretaking status and AUD did not interact; however, the significant main effects suggest an additive association, such that the combination of AUD severity and caretaking is more risky for IPV victimization than either factor alone. Findings highlight the importance of considering family composition and alcohol use behaviors on IPV risk.

Purpose

Since 2003, all domestic violence-related homicides in Ontario, Canada have been reviewed by an interdisciplinary committee. This committee conducts in-depth analyses to help understand what may have been done differently, with hindsight, and make recommendations to prevent similar tragedies in the future. This study examined all recommendations made by the Ontario Domestic Violence Death Review Committee over a 10-year period (2010–2020).

Methods

This study undertook a thematic analysis of all recommendations provided within 219 domestic homicide case reviews. Using a multistep coding process, several recurring themes were found across 400 recommendations.

Results

Results of this study identified consistent themes related to public awareness, professional education and enhanced systems, community agency collaboration and risk assessment, safety planning, and risk management.

Conclusions

These themes parallel findings by similar research studies undertaken in the United States, parts of the United Kingdom, Australia, and New Zealand. Ongoing challenges in the implementation of these recommendations and an evaluation of the impact of this work in reducing homicides is discussed.

Purpose

Intimate Partner Violence (IPV) during pregnancy can have serious consequences for maternal, infant, and child health. Importantly, the risk and consequences of IPV are greater for Black and Hispanic pregnant individuals than for White pregnant individuals. Thus, identification of IPV and referral to services during pregnancy is important, particularly for Black and Hispanic patients. Continuity of care and patient-centered care are thought to be essential for the identification of IPV in healthcare settings. Thus, we proposed that group prenatal care, which involves prenatal care providers delivering health, education, and support services to patients in a group setting, would create an atmosphere that is conducive to the identification of IPV. We specifically expected to see this effect among Black and Hispanic patients because group prenatal care has been hypothesized to increase the quality of the provider-patient relationship and reduce clinical bias against patients of color.

Methods

We conducted a secondary analysis of data from a randomized controlled trial of CenteringPregnancy (N = 523).

Results

We found that group prenatal care does have a significant, positive effect on IPV identification among prenatal care patients, but only for White women. Members of other racial and ethnic groups, who are at increased risk of experiencing IPV and its harmful consequences, do not receive this benefit.

Conclusions

Moving forward, researchers and practitioners should establish whether group prenatal care could be improved by intentionally incorporating a curriculum that directly addresses racial and ethnic disparities in quality of healthcare.

Trial Registration Number and Date

NCT02640638 (Prospectively registered 12/29/2015).

Background

In Western contexts, the behavior of domestically violent men is largely addressed through legal sanctions and standardised men’s behavior change programs. When domestically violent fathers remain together or in contact with their families, safety is an ongoing concern. However, program evaluations have failed to provide clear evidence for their effectiveness in addressing family violence in relation to parenting status. Part of the problem in developing efficacious programs has been the challenge of targeting them to typologies or socio-cultural needs of participants.

Purpose

The Caring Dads (CD) program supports father-change through leveraging men’s motivation to be positive parents, promoting child-centred fathering and cessation of family abuse. The aim of this study was to investigate whether participating fathers improved their co-parenting interactions, family functioning and wellbeing, and considered father characteristics and relationship statuses that coincided with positive outcomes.

Methods

This mixed method Australian study investigating a CD pilot incorporated psychological measures and semi-structured interviews at pre-, post- and 10 months post-intervention. Participants were fathers who attended CD in South-East Queensland, 2017–2019, and their co-parents.

Results

All fathers experienced improvements in parenting and family functioning by post-intervention, with greatest improvements for partnered fathers’ families. Partnered fathers also experienced improved parental alliance, unlike most separated fathers, although results must be viewed with caution due to small sample size and attrition across the study duration.

Conclusion

This study provides early support for improvements in CD participants’ fathering, parental alliance, and family functioning, most substantially for partnered fathers, though findings should be further investigated with larger cohorts.

Purpose: The pathways by which adverse childhood experiences (ACEs) are associated with early marriage and early pregnancy are poorly understood. Early marriage and early pregnancy may be risk factors for adulthood intimate partner violence (IPV). The aim of this study was to assess the relationships among ACEs, early marriage, early pregnancy, and IPV among women in Honduras.

Method: We used weighted data from 1,436 women aged 18-24 years from the nationally representative 2017 Honduras Violence Against Children and Youth Survey. We used path analysis to estimate relationships and accounted for sample design, non-response, and within-country clustering.

Results: We found that ACEs had differential relationships with outcomes of interest. For example, witnessing violence in the community was directly associated with increased probability of early pregnancy (10 percentage points (PP); 95% CI: 0.04, 0.15) and IPV (6 PP; 95% CI: 0.01, 0.10), while emotional violence was not directly or indirectly associated with any outcome. Early marriage and early pregnancy had no direct or indirect effect on IPV, but the total effect of early marriage on IPV was significant.

Conclusions: Understanding the relationship between ACEs, early marriage, early pregnancy, and IPV may help inform prevention efforts. For example, programs aiming to reduce early pregnancy may consider addressing sexual violence experienced in childhood.

 Purpose

The aim of this research study was to explore the lived experiences of women survivors of intimate partner violence to gain insight into how sociocultural contexts affected the processes of trauma recovery and posttraumatic growth for them.

Methods

Interpretive phenomenological analysis was used to design, conduct, and interpret data collected through semi-structured in-depth interviews. Six participants who experienced intimate partner violence in past romantic or marital relationships completed initial and follow-up interviews.

Results

Through in-depth data analysis and interpretation, five major themes related to sociocultural contexts that affected survivors emerged: (a) family, (b) friends, (c) schools and educational institutions, (d) community and neighborhood, and (e) law enforcement and judiciary agencies.

Conclusions

Findings indicate that supportive, unsupportive, or mixed responses from any of the listed sociocultural contexts can impact survivors’ processes of recovery and posttraumatic growth. Implications of findings and directions for future research are discussed.

Purpose

Young mothers are an understudied group at high risk for dating violence (DV) victimization and perpetration. Prior research has investigated depressive symptomatology as a predictor of DV in female adolescents and young women; however, minimal research focuses on young mothers, and the specific mechanisms influencing the relationship between depressive symptomatology and DV for young mothers remain elusive. Interpersonal competency is one potential mechanism given its role in creating healthy foundations for romantic relationships. The present study examined interpersonal competency as a potential mechanism linking depressive symptomatology and DV victimization and perpetration in a sample of young mothers. We hypothesized young mothers with elevated depressive symptomatology would report higher rates of DV victimization and perpetration, and that these associations would be mediated by interpersonal competence.

Methods

Young mothers ages 18–21 in the United States (n = 238) completed questionnaires pertaining to our primary variables of interest via an online, cross-sectional survey. We conducted a mediation analysis to examine the average causal mediation and average direct effects.

Results

DV experiences were related to depressive symptomatology and interpersonal competency. Interpersonal competency was not a mediator; however, direct effects were present between depressive symptomatology and DV victimization and perpetration.

Conclusions

Our results suggest that prevention interventions should target depressive symptomatology (i.e., hopelessness, feeling easily bothered, social isolation) and interpersonal competency (i.e., initiation, disclosure, emotional support) to reduce young mothers’ DV experiences.